BLUF – Attempted to load VMWare ESX 3.5i on a Lenovo T61. Failed to find device to write to in either AHCI or SATA Compatibility modes when attempting to use VMWare ESX Thin Installer.
So you’re not familiar with “BLUF”? Bottom Line Up Front…
Nonetheless, decided to attempt to pop in a spare 100 GB Seagate Momentus 7200 SATA hard drive into my Lenovo T61 Core 2 Duo laptop and attempt installation of the newly free VMWare ESX 3.5i software. Burned a copy of VMWare ESX 3.5i onto a CD and went from there, watching the ThinStaller make its way through the hardware compatibility list only to stop when it didn’t find the appropriate SCSI interface to load VMWare onto.
So lesson of the day – make sure that youv’e got a SCSI interface to allow VMWare ESX to continue its installation on your laptop if you’re hoping to use it as such. Good luck on finding a laptop with said interface 🙂
The Tech Blog of Dan Usher 